Category Archives: East Cambridge Commercial Real Estate

0 Cambridge Company Debuts Self-Driving Taxis

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Self Driving taxi from Cambridge start-up

Credit: Boston Globe

They might be driven in Singapore, but a small start-up at 1 Broadway in East Cambridge, nuTonomy Inc., has designed the control software to facilitates self-driving taxi cabs.

From the Boston Globe:

“This is the world’s first public trial of robo-taxi service,” said nuTonomy cofounder and chief executive Karl Iagnemma. “This is the start of what’s going to be a technology revolution.”

NuTonomy is providing the control software guiding the six taxicabs that debuted in Singapore, modified electric cars from French automaker Renault and Japan’s Mitsubishi. Each vehicle uses lasers and cameras to observe its surroundings and steer through Singapore’s business district. An engineer from nuTonomy was in the front seat, ready to take control if necessary, and a researcher in the rear monitored the cars’ computers.

0 MIT Plans to Further Transform Kendall Square, Main Street

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Office building in Cambridge on 1 main st

! Main Street, Cambridge

Changes in real estate keep coming, now MIT is elaborating on its plans for 1 Main Street in Kendall.

According to the Boston Globe, “University officials this week presented additional details of their plan for a reimagined Main Street, with new towers, wider sidewalks, welcoming open spaces, and clear signals to visitors that they have landed at MIT and in Kendall Square. The presentation before the city’s Planning Board on Tuesday night provided an overview of the $1.2 billion redevelopment project, which calls for converting six parking lots into offices, research space, hundreds of units of housing, and more than 100,000 square feet of retail. The six new buildings near Main would rise up to 300 feet tall.” The Globe article further explains, “City planners were largely supportive of MIT’s plan, though in a memo they expressed concern about “the scale and bulk” of some of the proposed buildings, warning that they might overwhelm pedestrians. Several members of the Planning Board agreed that the buildings appeared too imposing; some also called for more middle-class housing. But the board did certify that the plan met zoning and design guidelines.”

You can read the full article on the Boston Globe.

Available Office Listings and Area Details
Kendall Square Office Space

0 Kendall Square to Copley Move for Notable Cambridge Firms

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4 Copley Place

Credit: Wayfair

The pilgrimage to Boston continues as Cambridge tightens; InsightSquared and Architectural Resources will soon call Back Bay home.

The BBJ notes, “Business analytics firm InsightSquared, which just last spring moved into expanded office spaces at 160 Second St., this September will move to a 45,000-square-foot office at 4 Copley Place. The office spans two floors and is almost triple the size of Insight Squared’s 16,000-square-foot Kendall Square location…The expansion is driven by InsightSquared’s growing customer count and revenue, a company representative said. The office will also accommodate the firm’s growing employee base, which has doubled to more than 150 in the past year.”

You can real the full Boston Business Journal report on its website, here.

Relevant Available Real Estate in Boston and Cambridge
Kendall Square Office Space
Back Bay office space for lease

0 Kendall Square Office Space gets Remade

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200 Sidney st. cambridge ma

Credit: BBJ

Changes are on the move for East Cambridge. Vertex’s old HQ in Kendall Square is poised to be remade.

From the Boston Globe:

The deal will enable Biomed to begin renovating the buildings. They include two lab and office buildings at 200 Sidney St. and 40 Erie St., with a total of 239,000 square feet, that were leased to Vertex through this December, and another 21,000 square feet at 21 Erie St. that was leased to Vertex through May 2017.

Biomed said it will update the buildings’ entrances and lobbies, and add indoor and outdoor collaboration spaces and fitness centers. The work will begin immediately and the sites should be ready to be leased to new tenants starting in September, the developer said.

Related Listings
Kendall Square office space for lease

0 Multiple Projects from Boston Properties Progressing

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Boston office development north station

Credit: Boston Herald

Boston Properties is bullish on Boston with projects underway or proposed from Back Bay, Financial District and North Station.

·         888 Boylston has seen the crane arrive and has announced is major tenant Natixis Global Asset Management
·         100 Federal Street is looking to add more retail on the Congress Street side of the project

From the Boston Herald:

“In 2015, we estimate we could move approximately $1 billion in pre-development projects into our active development pipeline,” CEO Owen Thomas said. “Before launching any of these projects, we need to complete the entitlement and planning process and, in most cases, some level of pre-leasing.”

0 April Fools: Corporate Edition

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Boston mad men office design for april fools

Credit: The Boston Globe

April fools isn’t only for the water sprayer at the kitchen sink.  Some of the team at Endeavour Partners in Kendall Square were taken back when they arrived at their office on April 1st.

According to The Boston Globe, an elaborate April Fools’ Day prank was achieved by the office assistants and company chief executive Michael A.M. Davies; “more than a dozen computers and phones were replaced by typewriters, notepads, and rotary phones. Old records and copies of Life magazine were placed around the office, along with a bottle of whiskey for good measure…Neel Desai, an associate consultant, said the gag was indicative of the office culture at the company.”

You can read more about the ruse on The Boston Globe.

0 East Cambridge Office Space to Undergo Development

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:64 Sidney Street, Cambridge office spaceChanges are on the move for East Cambridge, with a deal on the horizon for Vertex’s old HQ. According to the Boston Globe, “the deal will enable Biomed to begin renovating the buildings. They include two lab and office buildings at 200 Sidney St. and 40 Erie St., with a total of 239,000 square feet, that were leased to Vertex through this December, and another 21,000 square feet at 21 Erie St. that was leased to Vertex through May 2017.”

Follow the link to view available office space in East Cambridge, or the Kendall Square overview.

0 Boston Office Rents Among Country’s Most Expensive

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Boston Rents continue its upward push with four office markets leading that charge: Back Bay, East Cambridge, Financial District and Seaport.  The Class A market within Back Bay is clearly leading the way, while some value still exists within the Class B market.  A real driver in the increased rents is the cost of tenant improvement dollars going from shell space to fix up space.  Not uncommon to see those numbers north of $75 per square foot.

office market in Boston

Credit: Boston Business Journal

According to the BBJ, “the Back Bay’s average rents hovered over $60 last year [while]…Midtown New York commanded about $130 per square foot, and both San Francisco and Washington rents topped $75 per square foot.”

You can read the full article on the Boston Business Journal.

0 Kendall Square Office Rents Reach Record Level

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4 Cambridge Center

Four Cambridge Center

With the boost of office rents in East Cambridge, Downtown Crossing has become the new hotbed for Redline creative and tech companies with Class B rents still in the $30’s PSF.

The Boston Globe is reporting “Office rents in Kendall Square have hit an all-time high of almost $67 per square foot, breaking a record last set in 2001, according to the real estate brokerage Transwestern RBJ…Transwestern said the average asking rent on a top-tier office space in East Cambridge set a new record of $66.63 in the final quarter of 2014, edging out the previous record of $65.85 set in 2001. East Cambridge’s vacancy rate of 6.7 percent was lower than many parts of Boston’s central business district, but higher than those of the smaller office markets of South Station, North Station, and Longwood, whose vacancy rates ranged from 2 to 4.4 percent.”

Additional insight on the East Cambridge boom is available on the Boston Globe.

Office availability and neighborhood information for Downtown Crossing and Kendall Square are available on the following submarket pages:
Downtown Crossing offices
Kendall Square office space

0 Cambridge Innovation Center at 15 Years Old

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One Broadway street CIC

Credit: Boston.About.com

Creating a community for innovators to innovate might be one of the most valuable innovations in Boston. Yes, the deals that are brought to market through CIC are what the VC’s are looking for, but without Tom Rowe’s platform — the Cambridge Innovation Center — some of these ideas may have been kept on the shelf and not made it to market.

A Boston Globe article offers some insight on CIC’s direction for the future:

“In April, [founder, Tim Rowe] opened the CIC Boston, a 60,000-square-foot shared office space downtown, and it has been just a few weeks since he opened CIC St. Louis, his first out-of-state venture and the largest startup space that is not on the East or West coast. Rowe was keen to cozy up to the Midwestern city’s startup scene: He saw promise in Washington University’s health care colossus and was tickled when Boeing opened offices in the 120,000-square-foot space — one of its first occupants. Lately, he has been shuttling to and from the Netherlands as he looks to take CIC global.”

Additional details and photos from the CIC’s 15th anniversary, are available on the Globe’s website.